10.12.2014

If This Isn't Nice, I Don't Know What Is


Dear Readers,

It has been a very busy summer, and an even busier fall.  I am now honored to hold a new job title with my company, a new student I.D. card with Boise State University, not to mention keeping up with Lucas and supporting the hell out of my talented and wonderful husband Shay.  

Not that you care.  Nor should you.  Isn't it boring when someone talks about how busy they are?  I just wanted you to know that I ignored my blog for completely selfish reasons, and when I wasn't doing one of the above, I was probably watching TV or sleeping in.  

Anyhow, it all ties into what I want to say this evening.  I'm doing a speech on the greatest thing in the world for my communications class next week: pie.  While searching the internet for pie quotes, I came across the gem I posted at the top this page from one of my favorite authors, Kurt Vonnegut.  I'll write it again, just to drill it in your head:  "I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, 'If this isn't nice, I don't know what is.'"  

This struck a heart chord with me.  Here I sit on a Sunday evening, typing away while decorates a poster board with his favorite architects for a school project and Yoshi the Cat lounges on my furniture, slowly but surely deforming the couch cushions with his immense weight, and though I am satisfied, I am not happy.  You know why?  I don't have any pie for one, which could be a contributor.  But the main reason is that my person is across the country and I'm just not the same without him.

Shay and I have seen our share of struggles over the last few years.  But the last year in-particular has been astonishingly good.  No, not good.  What I meant to say was extraordinary.  No, not extraordinary.  I mean, how do I say it?  How do I categorize the feeling of security, coupled with my hearts contentment, multiplied by my sincere and pure enjoyment of just knowing he's around?  It's not just love.  It's more than that.  

I had a conversation with a dear friend of mine the other day, while our goofy and wonderful children ran around like puppies.  We were talking about how, in any relationship, there is no magic.  Now, you're welcome to contradict me if you think I'm wrong, but I'll still call bull shit on you.  Sure there are fireworks and there's magnetism, and bolts of lightening straight to your heart!  Of course.  And those feelings can last for a while, for sure.  But are they sustainable?  No.  At one point or another, there will be time that one or the other or possible both in the relationship at the same time will want to punch the other in the face.  Or say the meanest thing they can think of.  Or slowly poison them to death over months and months.  It's important, those moments of hate, because that's when you get to make the choice to stay or to go.  And if you stay, you accept the challenge of working it out.  And that's my point:  it's work.

SO MUCH WORK.

Shay and I did it though.  We did the work.  We rolled around in the mud.  We lived apart for a little while.  We fought and we hated each other and we finally sat down and put it all out there and we worked it out.  We weren't the first couple to do this, and I'm sure we're not the last.  But you know what?

IT ALL WORKED.

So now, here I am, pining for a guy that I've known for almost 14 years to come back and hang out with me.  It's not that I'm a mess without him, it's just that I'm so much better when he's around.  And maybe he's better when I'm around too (if anything a little less forgetful).  I wanted him to go on this trip to New York, hell I bought the ticket and kind of forced him to go, because I want to see his dreams come true, and it's taken him one step closer to that realization.  But next time, I'm just going to have to go too.  Because finally, after all of these years, I'm happy to say we're a package deal.  This I know for sure to be true, tomorrow night when he comes home, and I get to just hang out with him again, I'm going to take Kurt's advice and I'm going to say to myself, "If this isn't nice, I don't know what is."

Now that I've grossed you all out with the details of my marriage, I want to leave you with one more quote from Kurt Vonnegut, that gets me through just about anything, and still serves me well today: "We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down."  

My wings are huge.

Sincerely,
h.